Info Tur

sâmbătă, 14 iunie 2008

I’m not into politics that much, although I admit that sometimes I speak very passionately about the matter, when I have the necessary amount of information about the subject held to debating.

I have to admit that the political campaign taking place for the city hall has caught my attention a little. The only three candidates that got my attention were at first, in the first tour, the PD-L candidate Vasile Blaga, the Independent Sorin Oprescu and the PNL candidate Ludovic Orban.

For three years now I have the right to vote, but I have never done it. I know that it is a civic right and duty, but no candidate has ever convinced me that his words are true. In what these elections are concerned, after Blaga and Oprescu managed to handle the fight, I have to say that I’m not convinced to chose any of them. I was sure before, that if Orban would have continued the race I would have definitely went to vote against him, as it was clear to me that he is a manipulator of the masses. Last year, he participated as a guest at one of my courses and all he could think of back than, when he was not campaigning, was to spill dirt on his future counter-candidates, although he was there to help teach us something about being a liberal.

Now, after the choice got easier because from the two candidates that remained to run for mayoryou could only chose one, again I find myself thinking about not going to vote. I would if I was sure that the now-Independent ex-PSD candidate Oprescu wouldn’t return to his old party once he got the vote of the citizens of Bucharest. But although he assured the people he wouldn’t do that, I can’t offer him my vote of trust in that regard, because if my fears were to become true I wouldn’t stand having a person from the Social Democrat Party at power again. They’ve had plenty of chances before, but managed to do only bad things for the people.

Moreover, now, after his former party colleagues had seen that he came first on the citizens’ choice in the first tour, they are offering him their support and showing off in the media with him in a very disturbing manner. His quality as a possible mayor is something that I can’t make a sure estimate upon, but the projects he had had in mind throughout his campaign were a little improbable for a city built with this infrastructure.

In what the other candidate is concerned, I believe that voting for Mr. Blaga would mean assuring the continuum of the former type of ruling on the city hall’s offices. The type that encouraged that parks should be private property for businessmen without morals that built business centers and malls on the scarce green space provided for Bucharest’s citizens, the type of manipulator that changed the curbstones 3 times in four years on the same boulevard, the type that only did what it’s master told him to and was politically influenced by the head of state, the type that would leave citizens in the same mess, lack of order and unbearable traffic jams… and so one. Voting for him would mean that one is in peace with this city’s way of providing the environment for its citizens and that he/she doesn’t need change nor wants it. And this is something that in my opinion no one, in their right mind or un-corrupted, could ever say: that they don’t want things to change. Not with today’s Bucharest. I for one hate that we only say “Little Paris” now about Bucharest ina contemplative manner, thinking about the Bucharest that once existed between the 2 World Wars, with the voice overwhelmed by sadness.I hate the dusty, strangled city that I live in and I wantnd need a change to happen to make me proud that I was born here, so I would never leave it drown in the same waters by voting for Mr. Blaga.

In conclusion, I won’t take part of the casting vote for mayor either, fourth time by now without formally expressing my point of view, because the list of pros and cons for both of the two candidates led me to the same standing point: none deserves it.

Nevertheless, I don’t advise anyone to take this stand in what exerting their civic duty and right is concerned. I am not even saying that I’m doing the right thing, in fact, I advise anyone who has a favorite candidate to give him their full support. I think that I’m only doing what’s best for me. Probably you can accuse me of being selfish, maybe I even am so, but what future candidate will ever think of me individually? Who ever does that even for the masses?

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization is the planet’s biggest military alliances; therefore its summit held in Romania was our countries largest and most important event after the Revolution in1989, as political annalists had described it at that time.

Not many people know even know – 2 months after the summit - the truth behind the masquerade shown on television. What was obvious to me was that for the extent of the summit the traffic was bearable in Bucharest, the streets were cleaner than ever before, police was all across the city and order seemed to rule everywhere.Beyond all the journalistic speculations, I believe that it is a hard thing to say what the exact consequences of the reunion our country hosted were. If you think about the matter in international measuring systems, the only conclusion that one would get to is that almost nothing had changed after the summit, nothing got any clearer, and all political disputes that existed before the event remained on the same level.

Therefore, the position that Greece had towards making official the name and status of Macedonia managed to postpone the republic’s admission to membership. As usual, this turned into a media scandal. The agreement upon Albania’s and Croatia’s joining didn’t come as a surprise for anyone, since NATO’s spreading towards these parts was a known fact. In what Afghanistan is concerned, the news were not good for Washington, as Canada’s decision to maintain it’s troops there and Romania’s and France’sdeal of offering a soldier supplementation of troops weren’t sufficient for US ambitions. Another predictable event of the summit was the debate upon the installation of the anti-racket shield, which led to no conclusions, and remained on the agenda of the next summit. The problem of NATO’s spreading towards the ex-soviet space by joining with Ukraine and Georgia had also a result to be expected, as it showed not only the predictable refusal of Russian officials to have the alliance so close to its borders, but also the quarrels on the subject between NATO officials on one hand, and of the two countries targeted, on the other. In conclusion, the big decision that all media were waiting for vanished in the dust of a political show and nothing else.

For Romanians, the summit had only a cosmetically produced effect. The Parliament’s Palace got in the Book of Records and the officials of the guest countries got to see a city which seemed to be placed in a decontaminated medical facility, as it was never shown to its inhabitants until present times.

Obviously, taking care of organizing this event so politically correct and immaculate in all senses will not get us, Romanians, any better, will not make our name triumph all across the globe and won’t even make us witness a tourist boom. Our President only managed to show, again, that he is a very well adjusted individual, as he unconditionally supported US’s intentions, only to try a few days after a close encounter with the Russian President in which he would warm up the relationship with Putin. Of course that for the unadvised and the people who can’t see behind the political statements, this is a great hit in what our president’s image is concerned, because he seemed very slick in bonding with two of the planet’s greatest people. For us, the others, the political diplomacy of our country looks as blind, incapable and in a total lack of leadership as it had been for years now. What is worse is that the obvious European ascension of the past years remains without an answer from our country’s part, as we seem to be living in a country that is almost on a metaphysical search of its own, singular, trajectory.

To conclude, I believe that that fact that the NATO summit was held in Romania was only dust in the wind for us, as citizens. And I have some solid argument to support my statement with: we didn’t manage to solve the problem with the elimination of visas, no conclusion was made in the Teo Peter case (and at least this one could have been solved by the Americans, at least as a political incentive for us) and not even the image boost wasn’t as our authorities imagined it to be.

Hey, at least we got amused on watching the news about the dogs walking on the unique corridors before official conveys!